Colorful and Notable Characters in Aviation

Most of our dads were/are characters to varying degrees, everything between a genial 1950s TV dad to Clark Griswold in Family Vacation. As I grew up and was around other guys’ dads, I came to realize that my Navy veteran dad was more colorful than average in his speech and a bit more of a character than usual. 

Do you remember the non-offensive, non-interesting people in your school or work background? Nah, me either. But the coach who had an interesting nickname for everyone, the gruff senior engineer, the over-the-top, larger than life personalities? Those are the people we tend to remember, and who make life a little more entertaining, whether in sports or aviation. And something about aviation lends itself to the presence of characters, meaning the rather colorful types that you tend to remember.

One of the first that comes to mind from the pages of history is Roscoe Turner, a pilot that pretty much defined the term flamboyant with his waxed mustache, a uniform that included jodhpurs, and a pet lion named Gilmore that flew with him, at least until it grew too big and unwieldy for being in an aircraft. Personally, I like to stick to pets that I don’t think have the potential to have me as a meal.

Another character was Douglas “Wrong Way” Corrigan who was repeatedly denied a trans-Atlantic flight permit by the Bureau of Air Commerce, and eventually took off from Floyd Bennett field and kept going east until he landed in Ireland. His explanation was “navigation error” and that he didn’t realize it until too late. It was an excuse as laughable as claiming you were clapping when calling a time-out, but one does have to admire the chutzpah and determination to make the flight, not to mention sticking to such an outrageous excuse. An added bonus was the clever, reversed headline in the New York Post. For many of us of a certain age, our first introduction to this story was the long-lost aviator character “Wrongway Feldman,” who was the first guest-star on Gilligan’s Island, appearing twice on that oft-visited atoll. Of note was that “Feldman” was flying the “Spirit of the Bronx,” an oblique reference to both the Spirit of St. Louis, and nearby Brooklyn where Corrigan departed for Ireland. 

One of the first aviation characters that I read about was Eddie Rickenbacker. I came across his autobiography in my high school library and made short work of it, in spite of the hardback version being several inches thick. If you haven’t read it yet, take the time to do so; the man’s accomplishments are nothing short of amazing. He had a career in the military, civil aviation, auto racing, including owning the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for over a decade, and founding his own car company. One anecdote from it that I recall had to do with a pilot Rickenbacker had flown with in the military, a fellow described as a malingerer. Per Merriam-Webster a malingerer is someone who always seems to develop an ailment when there’s work to be done. Fast forward to when Rickenbacker was running Eastern Airlines, and this same fellow had applied for a pilot position, had passed all his flying tests, and was only lacking Rickenbacker’s final approval for employment. Per the story, Rickenbacker recognized the guy’s name and told his chief pilot to take the guy up for a final check-ride and wash him out. “Why?,” questioned the chief pilot. “Because he’s a malingerer!” responded Rickenbacker. Seems a bit harsh on one hand, but I can certainly appreciate not wanting to hire a toxic or potentially non-productive employee.

When I was a new-hire on the flight-line at Boeing, a senior engineer at the desk in front of me would periodically spin around in his chair to face me, look me in the eye, and loudly ask, “Do you know your [stuff]?” (Except he didn’t say “stuff.”) I would allow that I thought so, to which he would reply, “See that you do!” I was a bit taken aback the first couple of times this happened, but over the years I’ve really come to appreciate that one bit of advice: make sure that you know your stuff. We had an active B-52 arrive on the flight-line one day, and this same senior engineer asked if I wanted to go onboard. (“Silly questions for $100, Alex”). We went out to the BUFF where he introduced himself as a former B-52 crew chief, after which we were given permission to tour the aircraft. Pretty cool for 23-year-old me.

Another character is one that I heard about second-hand from co-workers. It seems that the union went on strike and started picketing during 1st shift hours one day in the early 1990’s. Come the end of the day shift and the engineers all left to go home, only to find the way blocked by the picket line, with cars being allowed out one-at-a-time every five or ten minutes. This particular engineer finally had enough, pulled out of the line of cars, and gunned it for the gate saying, “Watch this!” In what would be a bit of a comedic scene in a movie, this engineer headed for freedom at full throttle in a full-sized sedan, with a lone picketer determined to block his way. As I understand it, the picketer lost the game of chicken, suffered a non-life-threatening injury, and the engineer picked up the nickname “Watch this!” in local aviation circles. Any repercussions are lost to history and we’re well past any statute of limitations. 

At another company, there was a group call (this is before video tele-conferences, kids) with a significant amount of information being exchanged. At some point, one of the call leaders asked a senior (in both position and age) engineer if he was writing all of this down, to which came the terse reply, “I’m not your [danged] secretary!” That is the stuff of legend. 

Young me was once sent on a mission to talk to a particular subject matter expert (SME) to pick his brain and learn what I could about the design issue we were addressing. The SME in question was a crusty old grump who was not one to suffer fools gladly, which my lead engineer was well aware of when he sent me into the breach. The initial encounter was not for the faint of heart, with his side of the introduction consisting of a glare, “What do you want?”, and “I don’t have time for this!” This was followed by him irritably asking to see what I had in hand, harumphing, and then spending a good 45-minutes teaching me what I needed to know. All in all a pleasant experience after the initial encounter. When I later returned with information in hand, my lead engineer asked how it had gone, then enumerated each step as if he had been present. I confirmed that the encounter unfolded exactly as he said, to which he nodded, saying “Sounds about right”. The point of this anecdote being that one can successfully be a character, a curmudgeon, and a good guy at the same time. Goals. 

A couple of characters that I would like to meet are found in the pages of our sister publication FLYING. 

The first is Martha Lunken, someone with whom I can imagine dinner or sitting around a fire stretching late into the evening with trading stories, the majority of them being hers. Aside from that temporary loss of license thing, I’d like to be her when I grow up. Fortunately, many of her escapades experiences are being captured in print; IMHO, a compilation volume is in order. On a non-aviation tangent, it was interesting to learn that her last name is related to the Lunkenheimer name of valves and steam whistles, of which I’m familiar due to a passion for steam engines and steam whistles. 

Another character from the pages of FLYING is Peter Garrison, who has apparently been writing for them since shortly after I appeared on the planet. In spite of a degree in English (with an aircraft name like Melmoth, was that even a question?) he has successfully designed, built, and flown two different aircraft by that name. Through no fault of his own, the first Melmoth was destroyed by a wayward Cessna, which led to a second iteration of that name but was a different design. 

One of the first Garrison columns I ever read was from the August 1992 issue of FLYING in which he paid tribute to John Thorp.

From that column and subsequent writings by Garrison, I gained an appreciation for Thorp’s knowledge and deep understanding not only of aircraft design, but metallurgy, loads, and stress calculations, not to mention some insight about John Thorp himself. Thorp definitely qualifies as a character, in a good way, as someone ready with pithy comments and opinions due to knowing his stuff. As for Garrison, his designs were, by his own admission, very complicated and structurally overbuilt. After reading his columns for the past few decades, I find myself sometimes scratching my head at his assertions, occasionally rolling my eyes or shaking my head in disagreement, but usually nodding in the affirmative or at least appreciating some food for thought. If I can accomplish even half as much, I’ll consider it a successful writing career. Likewise with my goal of becoming a curmudgeon at my day job and potentially a character in aviation.

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This article first appeared in the 2026 September Issue of KITPLANES magazine.